Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 will include the scenario seen in
yesterday's leaked video of the player participating in the
slaughter of civilians in the military shooter sequel, Infinity Ward confirms
for
VG247, though they stress that the scene can be skipped by those who will
find this troubling. They say: "The scene establishes the depth of evil and the
cold bloodedness of a rogue Russian villain and his unit. By establishing that
evil, it adds to the urgency of the player’s mission to stop them." As for
skipping it, word is: "Players have the option of skipping over the scene. At
the beginning of the game, there are two ‘checkpoints’ where the player is
advised that some people may find an upcoming segment disturbing. These
checkpoints can’t be disabled."

"It's pretty despicable to make the gamer responsible for personally committing blatant acts of cold-blooded murder on civilians.."

Did you miss the fact that they added a skip button? If you don't want to have the burden of killing civilian NPCs on you that is fine, skip it. I could see if they gave no warning to what the skippable scenes were, but obviously we now know and it won't be a problem. Along with the publicity, that is probably part of the reason they leaked it. Otherwise people would start the game and wonder, "A scene that could be offensive? I must check it out!" Now there is no excuse not to skip it if you think the concept is offensive.